No Good Alternative

Author: William T. Vollmann
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 0525558500
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 1293

Book Description
“The most honest book about climate change yet.” —The Atlantic “The Infinite Jest of climate books.” —The Baffler An eye-opening look at the consequences of coal mining and oil and natural gas production—the second of a two volume work by award-winning author William T. Vollmann on the ideologies of energy production and the causes of climate change The second volume of William T. Vollmann's epic book about the factors and human actions that have led to global warming begins in the coal fields of West Virginia and Eastern Kentucky, where "America's best friend" is not merely a fuel, but a "heritage." Over the course of four years Vollmann finds hollowed out towns with coal-polluted streams and acidified drinking water; makes covert visits to mountaintop removal mines; and offers documented accounts of unpaid fines for federal health and safety violations and of miners who died because their bosses cut corners to make more money. To write about natural gas, Vollmann journeys to Greeley, Colorado, where he interviews anti-fracking activists, a city planner, and a homeowner with serious health issues from fracking. Turning to oil production, he speaks with, among others, the former CEO of Conoco and a vice president of the Bank of Oklahoma in charge of energy loans, and conducts furtive roadside interviews of guest workers performing oil-related contract labor in the United Arab Emirates. As with its predecessor, No Immediate Danger, this volume seeks to understand and listen, not to lay blame--except in a few corporate and political cases where outrage is clearly due. Vollmann is a carbon burner just like the rest of us; he describes and quantifies his own power use, then looks around him, trying to explain to the future why it was that we went against scientific consensus, continually increasing the demand for electric power and insisting that we had no good alternative.

No Immediate Danger

Author: William T. Vollmann
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 0399563504
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 626

Book Description
“The most honest book about climate change yet.” —The Atlantic “The Infinite Jest of climate books.” —The Baffler A timely, eye-opening book about climate change and energy generation that focuses on the consequences of nuclear power production, from award-winning author William T. Vollmann In his nonfiction, William T. Vollmann has won acclaim as a singular voice tackling some of the most important issues of our age, from poverty to violence to the dark soul of American imperialism as it has played out on the U.S./Mexico border. Now, Vollmann turns to a topic that will define the generations to come--the factors and human actions that have led to global warming. Vollmann begins No Immediate Danger, the first volume of Carbon Ideologies, by examining and quantifying the many causes of climate change, from industrial manufacturing and agricultural practices to fossil fuel extraction, economic demand for electric power, and the justifiable yearning of people all over the world to live in comfort. Turning to nuclear power first, Vollmann then recounts multiple visits that he made at significant personal risk over the course of seven years to the contaminated no-go zones and sad ghost towns of Fukushima, Japan, beginning shortly after the tsunami and reactor meltdowns of 2011. Equipped first only with a dosimeter and then with a scintillation counter, he measured radiation and interviewed tsunami victims, nuclear evacuees, anti-nuclear organizers and pro-nuclear utility workers. Featuring Vollmann's signature wide learning, sardonic wit, and encyclopedic research, No Immediate Danger, whose title co-opts the reassuring mantra of official Japanese energy experts, builds up a powerful, sobering picture of the ongoing nightmare of Fukushima.

No Alternative

Author: William Dickerson
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780985188672
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 272

Book Description
"Simultaneously brutal and funny, caustic and caring, 'No Alternative' is a sacrament to be shared by all the survivors who grew up at the tail end of the fragmenting century." -Jack O'Connell, author of "The Resurrectionist" "No Alternative" is a coming-of-age drama that drills a hole into the world of suburban American teenagers in the early '90s. Thomas Harrison is determined to start his own alternative band, an obsession that blinds him to what's either the mental collapse, or the eruption of musical genius, of his little sister, Bridget. Bridget boldly rejects her brother's music, and the music of an entire generation of slackers, by taking on the persona of a gangsta' rapper named "Bri Da B." "No Alternative" probes the lives of rebellious kids who transition into adulthood via the distortion pedals of their lives in an era when the "Sex, Drugs & Rock 'n' Roll" ethos was amended to include "Suicide" in its phrase. "No Alternative" is now a major motion picture starring Michaela Cavazos, Conor Proft, Chloe Levine, Kathryn Erbe and Harry Hamlin. This updated edition of the novel includes a Foreword by Harry Hamlin and an Afterword by William Dickerson, which explores the making of the film.

The Good Book

Author: A. C. Grayling
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN: 0802778380
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 610

Book Description
Few, if any, thinkers and writers today would have the imagination, the breadth of knowledge, the literary skill, and-yes-the audacity to conceive of a powerful, secular alternative to the Bible. But that is exactly what A.C. Grayling has done by creating a non-religious Bible, drawn from the wealth of secular literature and philosophy in both Western and Eastern traditions, using the same techniques of editing, redaction, and adaptation that produced the holy books of the Judaeo-Christian and Islamic religions. The Good Book consciously takes its design and presentation from the Bible, in its beauty of language and arrangement into short chapters and verses for ease of reading and quotability, offering to the non-religious seeker all the wisdom, insight, solace, inspiration, and perspective of secular humanist traditions that are older, far richer and more various than Christianity. Organized in 12 main sections----Genesis, Histories, Widsom, The Sages, Parables, Consolations, Lamentations, Proverbs, Songs, Epistles, Acts, and the Good----The Good Book opens with meditations on the origin and progress of the world and human life in it, then devotes attention to the question of how life should be lived, how we relate to one another, and how vicissitudes are to be faced and joys appreciated. Incorporating the writing of Herodotus and Lucretius, Confucius and Mencius, Seneca and Cicero, Montaigne, Bacon, and so many others, The Good Book will fulfill its audacious purpose in every way.

Capitalist Realism

Author: Mark Fisher
Publisher: John Hunt Publishing
ISBN: 1803414316
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 116

Book Description
An analysis of the ways in which capitalism has presented itself as the only realistic political-economic system.

The Alternative: Most of What You Believe About Poverty Is Wrong

Author: Mauricio L. Miller
Publisher: Lulu.com
ISBN: 1483472264
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 227

Book Description
Clara Miller, President of the F. B. Heron Foundation: The Alternative, is not only important reading, it's imperative. Miller, a trained engineer, the one-time manager of a top social service organization and most importantly, the son of a remarkable single mother, has both lived and observed the failings embodied in our attitudes toward the poor and, as a result, the flaws in our systems meant to help people in poverty. He merges heart and soul with system thinking to yield a prescription featuring the real math, trust relationships and courage that can change the "us and them," to "upward together" and put American families in the driver's seat to build their futures.

More Harm than Good?

Author: Edzard Ernst
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3319699415
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 240

Book Description
This book reveals the numerous ways in which moral, ethical and legal principles are being violated by those who provide, recommend or sell ‘complementary and alternative medicine’ (CAM). The book analyses both academic literature and internet sources that promote CAM. Additionally the book presents a number of brief scenarios, both hypothetical and real-life, about individuals who use CAM or who fall prey to ethically dubious CAM practitioners. The events and conundrums described in these scenarios could happen to almost anyone. Professor emeritus of complementary medicine Edzard Ernst together with bioethicist Kevin Smith provide a thorough and authoritative ethical analysis of a range of CAM modalities, including acupuncture, chiropractic, herbalism, and homeopathy. This book could and should interest all medical professionals who have contact to complementary medicine and will be an invaluable reference for patients deliberating which course of treatment to adopt.

Everfair

Author: Nisi Shawl
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 076533805X
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 384

Book Description
An "alternate history novel that explores the question of what might have come of Belgium's ... colonization of the Congo if the native populations had learned about steam technology a bit earlier"--Amazon.com.

The 3rd Alternative

Author: Stephen R. Covey
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1451626274
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 480

Book Description
From the multimillion-copy bestselling author of "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People" comes a breakthrough approach to conflict resolution and creative problem solving in this groundbreaking work.

No Alternative?

Author: Nancy Abelmann
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 0520289803
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 173

Book Description
Nancy Abelmann is Harry E. Preble Professor and associate vice chancellor for research (humanities, arts, and related fields) at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Jung-Ah Choi is an adjunct faculty member at Fairleigh Dickinson University. So Jin Park is a research fellow at the institute for Social Development Studies at Yonsei University. --Book Jacket.